


last stop: home

by warofthefoxes



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Neighbors, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-03
Updated: 2018-10-19
Packaged: 2019-07-24 14:11:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16176698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/warofthefoxes/pseuds/warofthefoxes
Summary: renjun moves from cities to cities day in day out. this is the last one. this time, he's staying.a non-linear narrative of neighbors jaemin and renjun





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> i haven't published anything i've written for almost 2 years but hello,,

"we're staying? for good?" renjun asks his father as they unload the bags and boxes from the backseat of their car. they always stay on motels, cottages of people his father had once or twice talked to, maybe some worn out villas, or if none, their own set-up tents in the wild, the whooping wind of the nearby forest trees hugging them, but they’ve never stayed for too long. maybe two weeks the most, but they always return back to the road, moving from one city to another.

 

renjun looks up at his father and then to the houses across, trees lined up on the sidewalk. it's almost winter, the leaves turned to a shade of crimson and orange within days of travel down south. he thinks it's tuesday today, a week past november but he can't quite be sure, not when they're always moving. 'it's not a good excuse.' his mother used to tell him whenever he whined, but only as a reminder. they've got to at least know their dates, it isn't that hard to keep track of them as time passes by she said.

 

"i can't believe i'm saying this but yes, yes we are." his father tells him and the way he says this reminds renjun of old television shows he's seen on diners they stop at for lunch when his father is being generous. or when his mother tires out of work and would rather not cook.

 

he takes a look at the house before them this time - a bungalow, brick walled and the porch painted yellow, a small yard with grass that comes up to the knees of his younger brother. he's read a few books he's bought from various city stores, few because there's too much he hasn't read and second hand, some pages put together with scotch tape because they're a lot cheaper. the houses described on the books, are a bit different from what he's read, and maybe far too different from what they used to stay in. he's not really sure he remembers how it looked like but he remembers they had once settled down. he's not young enough to be innocent with some things like what it meant to have a bungalow and to why this is what they have right now but he's not complaining.

 

"hyung, your camera." his brother hands him. it's an old brand, run by batteries and films his mother got him for his 12th birthday. it's a good one too, not that it's what he wanted when he turned 12. maybe he wanted new watercolor set, maybe a casette player of his own to play his tapes, maybe a saxophone, he always thinks he'd do good playing a saxophone, but not a camera even though he's learned to love it now.

 

he picks up his old converse's shoe box where he keeps his developed photos and extra films and walks to check their new home.

 

there are cobwebs on the porch, an antique shelf on the living room that looks as if it's bones would break if touched. he's once had this impression when they went to see his great grandmother before she passed and it's disrespectful he thinks so he doesn't say it outloud but he does say the irony of it still being called 'living'. there's a small kitchen, the tiles of the counter mostly broken, the doors of cabinet missing their handles. his mother places the stove on top beside the faucet and starts heating water for tea.

 

he hears his brothers already planning how to set up can telephones using strings - a thing they picked up on the daily paper their father gets every morning as they drink milk. next to their room comes his room - one that has a window, 'i know you love windows', his mother had told him as he passed.

 

renjun is excited. he’s never had a room of his own, a wall of his own, a door of his own. it's definitely not much, the wallpaper a shade of blue that looks like it'll swallow him once he sleeps, the mattress worn, springs squeaking when he sits down on it, but it's way better than sitting long hours inside a car. he loved the travel but he craved for this a little bit more.

 

he goes to the window that looks over their lawn, the street is wet today, the clouds covering the sun from coming up to his room. "this needs mowing." he says as his fingers touch the tips of the grass from the window. he places his box and camera on top of the table and goes out to get more boxes.

 

moving from one place to another leaves him no chance to actually have a friend except his brother. it's fun with him he knows, they collect shells from sidewalks not sure where to use them for but lets them fill in their pockets, he teaches him how to make paper airplanes and origamis he's learned to make from textbooks, they wash up on rivers they pass by, run if the traffic isn't bad. he likes his brother but he'd he's read stories, articles about friends, adventures, group of people you can make memories with, good and bad. he wanted that.

 

his father asks them every new year what they want, and it gets draggy sometimes, leaving him hopeful. on his 14th year, he told him he wanted to try to go to school. a normal school. now that he's 15, he would never say to his father but he wants friends. friends of his age that is, and maybe, he thinks sometimes, that it's a bit too late to start having them. as far as he knows, boys of his age like talking about girls and video games - both that he has no real knowledge of. he knew his mother, maybe his aunt who sends them clothes every month, his little cousin, but that's all. he supposes that doesn't count, he likes nature and running and climbing up hills, likes reading and discovering things he doesn't know before, he likes those but he doesn't know who else does.

 

not that he minds being friends with older people who seem to understand his past time better. he has talked to a lot of them when they went to help around in an elderly shelter, but it'll be nice to know people the same age as him, he thinks, who can talk about things, things running in his mind for that matter, things that don't matter, no longer imagined, he thinks he'd get there soon.

 

he stays at the front porch, sits and looks over at their neighbor's houses. "neighbor", renjun says, the roll of it in his tongue sounding too unfamiliar.

 

he feels a tap on his shoulder all of a sudden, the touch startling him. it could be his parents, or his brother bothering him about being around his height when he’s two years younger. he hears his mother calls from the inside saying the tea is ready, and renjun turns to see another boy, someone he hasn't seen before, hand on mid air as if to repeat the tap.

 

"my mom asked if you needed help with the moving. we live across your house." the boy says and he stares for a bit before shaking his head, smiling a little. the boy in front of him is wearing a grey sweater over a collared shirt and a pair of jean pants, the colors in contrast to his dandelion pullovers. he's not sure if that's how he should call the color but it's what his little brother points it out to be.

 

"we don't have much to move but thanks for the offer." it's the first time he's talked to someone younger than 20 since they moved from the other city 21 miles from here. he smells like renjun's old mondays, after laundry shop visits and ice cream parlors. he looks over at the house across theirs - two storey and beige.

 

 

"i think you mentioned something about mowing a while ago." the boy speaks up again, eyes looking following his line of sight. mowing, that was a while back when he was checking the lawn through the window, must be awhile since his neighbour walked to their lot. he must have talked loud. or their walls must be too thin.

 

he looks at the grass and back to the boy again. "we don't have a mower." he says and in social cues, at least in child stories, his neighbour would've said 'we do' but his, the grey sweatered neighbour just says 'then we better get started then', beaming at him and looking a lot younger than what he looked like when he first tapped his shoulder.

 

"i'd ask my mom first about it."

 

and morning comes the next day, renjun awakened by the rays of sun peeking through his window. he smiles, stretching, looking at the bare walls planning ahead what to put in there - his city map, his photos maybe, a blackboard. he stands up and walks, jogs in place, stopping to smooth his hands over the wooden table near his window. he takes a look at their badly trimmed lawn, their car parked and unwashed from the travel, then his neighbor's house. he wonders what it looks from the inside, what color is their couch, do they listen to the local radio, what's their favorite movie. his mother knocks on his door to say breakfast is ready so renjun takes one swift look outside his window and thinks he'd get there soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok first i'd like to clear up now that this is going to be a non-linear narrative fic so the next chapter won't exactly start off from the end of the previous chapter. it could time skip to weeks or months or years after!
> 
> for context: jaemin and renjun are 15 years old here in this chapter. but the current story plot i have is set until they're 18.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jaemin and renjun live across each other and like to sleep over at each other's places.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> notes to take: this takes place roughly 3 years after the first chapter. also jisung and renjun are brothers here if you haven't figured. and fluff,, like cheesy fluff

“you know you could easily search this up on youtube injun-ah!” jaemin says as he takes renjun’s laptop from his lap, typing the ip address as renjun recites the numbers beside him, pouting.

 

“but thanks for calling me injunnie ~.” he says soon after with glee as he does the rest of his job. renjun has called him to come over, going a fit over jisung and his bratty actions and how “moving jisung” as he calls his brother from 3 years ago before settling in this house, was an easier jisung to deal with. telling jaemin about how his puberty was possibly the worst of all teenagers now that jisung won’t miss pointing out he’s a head taller than renjun every morning during breakfast with being 2 years younger. jaemin listens, adorns how renjun’s voice sounds a bit higher when he’s pressed like this, his hand moving animatedly as he rants over to him and jaemin offers small words to make renjun feel he’s on his side, nods even when most of what goes on his head is that renjun is cute, even cuter when he’s angry.

 

“there, jisung won’t have access to your wifi.” he says, clicking the exit button of browser.

“like temporarily?” renjun asks.

“until you let him to.”

 

and after a while, they hear jisung whining from the living room, groaning about how the soccer match he’s streaming suddenly buffered before showing an error message because _there’s no internet connection_ and jaemin sees renjun chuckle beside him in triumph, turning his head to him for a smile and a small thanks before they head out for renjun’s mom’s home cooked dinner.

 

like an unspoken tradition, after dinner and spending what is a respectable time of casual talk with the family and forcing jisung to do the dish duty for the night, they retreat back to renjun’s room.

 

unspoken because it’s not like they agreed upon this and written a contract that goes _i. you’re sleeping over if you eat dinner with my family_ it’s just how things had been after a year renjun and his family moved in across jaemin’s house and how it’s somehow reasonable enough to stay over usual “visiting hours” even when the other room is less than a minute away.

 

jaemin plops down on renjun’s bed as the other stretches - something he does to pass time and allow his food to digest and keep a flat stomach, something jaemin isn’t sure works but lets renjun indulge to.

 

renjun’s room looks different, smells different from when jaemin first saw it - the blue wall now white after they painted it last spring break, the other wall near the door painted with a mural renjun had done a little year back when jaemin was away for a month. there’s two scented candles on the bed table, one that they made themselves for fun, the other something that he got for him last christmas. renjun is still standing in the middle of the room with his same dandelion pullover that jaemin belatedly realizes is the same one from when they first met.

 

“you still have that?” he asks, moving to lie on his side so he could watch renjun.

“hm?”

“that sweater” he points out.

renjun smiles. “i’m still not used to having so much.” he tells him, finally sitting down on the carpet, the anger from before all seeped out and gone until jisung’s next banter. renjun in his room’s fluorescent light and the moonlight reflecting from his window already looks so much softer. he fixes jaemin’s hair and continues his words from before “just used to keeping the important ones.”

 

the moment is interrupted with jisung knocking on the door, announcing he’s done with the dishes and asking for his wi-fi access to be back. jaemin rolls his eyes, shuffles from where he’s lied down to open renjun’s laptop and get it over with. he likes jisung sure, a little bit too much than what is needed, renjun says sometimes, but now is not the time. not when his injun is saying THAT to him.

 

once he’s done, renjun’s hands are already on his phone, no longer stroking his hair. in the next minute, renjun is asking him to pass the laptop so he could work on his essay, then tells the him to work on his too.

 

“i hate your work ethic sometimes.” jaemin says as he moves to grab his own laptop he packed earlier when he left his house.

renjun hums, sticks a finger on jaemin’s chest and replies “you should have my work ethic sometimes.”

 

-

 

after an hour of working on their essays, half of it jaemin spent looking at renjun until the he’s told off by the older who also spent his time turn poking at jaemin’s screen after he finished his work and proclaimed hyuck and jeno are being boring on their group chat, they decide to wash up.

 

they tiptoe their way to the bathroom, careful not to wake renjun’s parents on the other room. jisung is sprawled on the living room’s couch, fast asleep in the middle of a basketball game he promised chenle to watch. renjun lets jaemin wash up first, and when jaemin walks back to ask renjun where the toothpaste is placed again, he sees him covering jisung with a blanket.

 

jaemin heads back to renjun’s room first, cleaning up the bed for them. he’s already on his side of the bed when renjun re-enters, wearing a loose shirt that was once mr. huang’s, turning the lamp hanging at the foot of the bed, before going back to turn off the room’s light and slipping beside jaemin.

 

“hi.” jaemin says once renjun is lied down, poking his cheek so he would turn his head to him.

 

night time does something to renjun and jaemin hasn’t dared enough to say anything to the other than a ‘you look pretty in the moonlight’ - something that renjun had taken with a soft giggle, telling him to stop with his sugar addiction. nighttime does something to renjun that jaemin is grateful to experience. the way his eyes glow in the dim lighting of the room staring at the wall at the back of jaemin’s head and at him from time to time as if to make sure he hasn't fallen asleep on him (“that was one time! i had to work overtime that day so i could buy us the tickets to the horror house!” jaemin tells him whenever renjun brings it up, calls out jaemin being uninterested in him, for falling asleep one time while he was talking), the way his skin feels warmer somehow, his touches softer as he cuddles jaemin back, his voice muffled as he whispers his conspiracy theories, ones that are too crazy for even jisung to hear but jaemin could because ‘you always listen to me well. i know you wouldn’t laugh at me.’ renjun had told him. and jaemin wouldn’t dare tell him more about how night time brings out another side of renjun, something that day time renjun, all bark and blunt does not hold, a piece of “moving renjun” and his little adventures, a part that maybe renjun isn’t aware himself that comes out. jaemin wouldn’t say because he’s afraid renjun would turn back and be more cautious about himself. he wants this space, in their dim-lit room, to be a universe where they’re free to be themselves.

 

renjun moves to face him finally and they stare at each other wordlessly. tonight, renjun doesn’t share a theory he has, either waiting for him to break the silence that jaemin is enjoying for now.

 

“wanna sleep?” he finally asks. renjun shakes his head a little.

“what do you want to do?” jaemin asks again. renjun staring at him intently.

a beat before renjun groans, pressing his forehead onto jaemin’s, telling him “i was trying to do telepathy with you.”

he scoffs at renjun patting his head. “next time, next time.” he whispers to him with a smile.

renjun moves away to look at him again, less intense than the first time, and with so much care that makes jaemin almost blush.

 

“you know you’re important to me right?” renjun finally speaks in hushed voice taking jaemin a little bit surprised, his heartbeat picking up at the words. it’s his unofficial role to be the one prepared with sweet nothings during bed time that it always catches him by surprise when renjun lets one of his many lines slip like they do tonight.

 

“of course.” he replies in confidence. he’s lucky to be familiar with renjun’s language of love - the little notes he leaves before walking back home after sleeping over at jaemin’s house, renjun holding his hand a tad too long on the porch when he’s sending him home, renjun packing enteritis medicine every day because he always forgets, and every other little renjun thing.

 

“you’re my first friend.” renjun continues, more shy than the first sentence and jaemin adores him even more.

 

“and first boyfriend! and first kiss and first date and what else - “

 

“shut up shut up!”

 

jaemin coos over renjun covering his face, avoiding his eyes.

 

“you’re important to me too, injun.”

 

renjun making a muffled sound right after that jaemin didn’t catch so he asks.

 

“i said let’s go to sleep.”

 

and sleep they do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jaemin and renjun only talked briefly for 3 times bc i suck at dialogues :'( ,,


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> renjun tries to make a home out of the new place and the first friend he met.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter follows the first chapter. so we're back with renjun and jaemin's first meet ups and getting to know ,,

the second time renjun sees the grey sweatered guy is on a saturday morning with his right hand up in mid-air about to repeat a knock and a home-baked pie on the other. he tries to smile as the door fully opens, moving back his right hand to extend the plate of pie with both hands to his new neighbour, his first neighbour.

 

“my mom wanted to give this to your family as we moved in yesterday.” renjun says, bowing his head politely.

 

“jaemin hyung!” jisung shouts from behind him, on their porch. jaemin, renjun thinks, ah, that was his name. jisung had been overly friendly yesterday when they were trimming the lawn and had managed to befriend their new neighbour who was kind enough to help them.

 

“thank you renjun!” his neighbour, jaemin, says after waving back to jisung, taking the pie from him with a smile.

 

renjun startles hearing his name, eyes blinking twice faster, hands still on his side as jaemin loses his smile slowly, noticing the initial shock from him.

 

“do you need anything else?”

 

and renjun breaks from the shock, wills himself to wave his hands to sign no. “sorry, it’s nothing. enjoy the pie.” renjun says, half turning, ready to walk back to their house, jaemin waving awkwardly at him. the little conversation already half-forgotten at the end of the day.

 

-

 

the third time renjun sees him, the grey sweater is exchanged with a white character tee - the character from some cartoon renjun thinks is famous for how often he’s seen it on the diners they’ve eaten at and shops he’s visited cities to cities. the third time renjun sees jaemin is at his own house’s living room, still blinking away the sleep from last night, longer than usual because it’s saturday and weekends are for sleeping in. he spends a minute wondering if he just slept walk and was currently dreaming, when he hears his mom greet him good morning from the kitchen.

 

apparently, renjun’s mother has arranged for them to do grocery, leaving him unnotified until he woke up on the day itself. with renjun being new to the place, she kindly asked their neighbor’s son to help him get to the supermarket and show him around. “i think it’s good for you to get a friend as we’re staying here longer. jaemin seems to be a very nice kid.” she told him before handing the list of things he needed to buy and some money, placing a kiss to his temple as she sends him off with jaemin waiting by their house’s door.

 

“sorry you had to wait. i didn’t know i was supposed to get up early.” renjun starts as they pick up their bikes. jaemin told him in passing earlier that the market was close enough for a bike and it was more environment friendly than driving that neither of them can do anyway. the last time that renjun can remember he rode his bike was early january that year, the road was empty and they took their time biking freely, him on his bike he got when he was 11 and jisung perched at the back of his dad’s mountain bike because he never learned enough to ride on his own.

 

“it’s okay. your mom was a good conversationalist so i didn’t bother waiting.” jaemin replies as they ride their bikes. “follow me.”

 

the bike ride was something that renjun he didn’t know he needed. it was one thing to see a neighbourhood from the window of his car seat that feels uncomfortable once he’d sat on it too long, but it’s freeing to be in a bike. seeing the houses in slower motion, slow enough to wonder if it was their first house or their sixth. him and jaemin fill their time doing small talk, finding out they’re of the same age, that jaemin doesn’t have a sibling, and that he thinks jisung is cute.

 

“how did you know about my name?” renjun asks, suddenly remembering the conversation from last time when he was delivering pie.

 

“ah” jaemin replies with a little laugh, seemingly amused. “jisung told me.”

 

they reach the market then, parking their bikes side by side. renjun picks the list his mom gave him from his pocket and enters the store, jaemin in tow.

 

“not to pry or anything but jisung mentioned something about this being your first home?” jaemin asks warily as they go over the aisle where jaemin said the loaf bread are.

 

renjun expected this question will pop up sometime soon. maybe not in the middle of the supermarket but soon. “well, he’s right technically.” he replies. “our first home in awhile. jisung doesn’t remember the first house we were in and the car has been our house for most part.” renjun continues, looking at jaemin who doesn’t seem like he gets the whole thing but he’s trying.

 

“because of our circumstances, we were always moving.” renjun tries again. “not exactly from houses although we sometimes stayed in houses but we moved.” he pauses, taking a brief look at jaemin again who’s intently listening. he tries hard to find a way to explain it without oversharing. not that it was something he didn’t want to talk about. he just thinks it’s too soon. do friends talk about family issues first thing before they talk about the favorite color, favorite number, the questions they ask in those slambooks renjun was too shy to buy whenever he comes across them in the bookstores. how do you even know if you’re friends with someone? renjun wonders again. does being neighbour equate to that? is jaemin his friend now by default? he tries to shake the questions out of his head and proceed with the grocery shopping. “we just move from cities to cities in our car almost all the time.” he finishes, giving a small smile to jaemin before he moves to find the cereals aisle.

 

“that’s cool.” he hears jaemin say behind him. he turns his back to ask him why does he think so.

 

jaemin shrugs, picking the box of cereal for renjun and putting it in his cart. “you were basically travelling for years now. i think that’s cool you’ve been around a lot of places.”

 

“yeah i guess.” renjun doesn’t know why that made him smile more than he wanted to. “i guess it’s cool if you put it that way.”

 

they finish renjun’s grocery list in no time. maybe a little longer than it would normally take, jaemin being a bad guide, sounding more unsure about where to find the items. they went back to doing small talk, each aisle filled with little questions, nothing too personal. by the end of it, he finds out jaemin is lactose intolerant (“aren’t we all?” renjun asks which jaemin replies with a question if he is and renjun could only say “not quite” but still), he likes sweets and his favorite color is white.

 

on their way back, only after stopping to get a soft serve ice cream (jaemin’s request), renjun figures jaemin might be his friend now.

 

renjun walks back to his room, looks at the old shoebox where he’s kept the photos he took throughout the years. he picks it up, opens and scans the photos in his collection - their most recent family picture from the last city, something they’ve kept as tradition since renjun got his camera, jisung scrunching his nose out of habit that renjun managed go get on film, a picture of a tree he still hasn’t figured what is called, a stray cat he found while he was strolling around in daegu the last time they were there. he takes his sticky tack and looks at his empty blue wall, planning and envisioning how to put up the pictures in it.

 

-

the fourth time renjun sees jaemin is by coincidence. he was throwing the trash out when jaemin was coming back from school, wearing his uniform neatly, his shoes a little worn out and dirty. and him in his old shirt and sweats.

 

“hey!” jaemin calls him, waving as he jogs to him. he waves back, shifting his feet awkwardly until jaemin reaches him.

 

“how was school?” renjun begins asking. school was something he’d once experience but could not recall. he’d been doing his studying on his own for years now, with his own chosen books and modules his parents buys him every year, sharing some of the things he picks up to jisung when the latter was interested enough to listen.

 

“it was boring.” jaemin sighs, crouching down to sit on the pavement. renjun following him after.

 

“only fun part was gym class because hyuck fell in front of mark and he got super shy because of it.” jaemin tells him like he knows and has met these people. he thinks it’s something he’s starting to like whenever jaemin talks to him. he makes him feel included, like he’s been a part of this whole story and not just some quite intermission to make things interesting, here on the first scene and gone the next. it makes him feel something he hasn’t felt in all those years of moving.

 

“you think you’d start going to school now?” jaemin asks after he’s finished sharing what else happened during the rest of their gym period.

 

he takes time to think about it. “i wish.” he says with a sigh. “i’m not sure we’re staying. might be one of those times my dad decide on something only to take it back after 2 weeks.”

 

“then we’ll wait 2 weeks?” the other says, surprising him again with the replies he didn’t think would come.

renjun is being called back by his mom inside. “yes. 2 weeks.” he replies, giggling as he walks back inside.

-

somehow, renjun sees jaemin more often the next days. sometimes unplanned, one time outside when renjun decides to take his bike around again meeting jaemin while he’s on way back to his house from school again, renjun walking his bike instead until jaemin had changed in comfortable clothes to bike around with him. sometimes they just sit on the pavement like last time or under their front porch, talking - renjun letting some stories slip from his travels as jaemin calls them, or just stories from the way there. some where renjun had to tell his dad to stop so he could take photos.

 

“can i see?” jaemin asks interrupting him. “i mean if you only want to.

“well, i placed most of them in my room’s walls so next time.”

 

one time, jaemin startles him while he was hanging out inside their car. he borrowed the keys from his dad, mr. huang only giving it to him once he made sure renjun won’t try to drive without him. renjun can’t drive but weirdly, he missed being inside it so he hang out there, to read some book. he hasn’t done any much reading with all the moving in they had to do and errands his mother keeps sending him so he snuck out, with a blanket, to sit inside their car like he usually did.

 

jaemin must have seen him from outside, their car’s windows not a 100% tinted and knocked loud, making renjun jump from his seat. jaemin laughing out loud at his face from outside, almost falling to the ground with how much he’s laughing.

 

jaemin hung out with him in the car after, telling him about his day in school and renjun sharing something about pottery from the documentary he watched, stopping mid-way to apologize because it’s not any fun but jaemin only tells him to continue, adding questions in between renjun’s narration.

 

often times when they don’t meet, they talk on the phone. renjun realizes he hasn’t talked to anyone that isn’t his family for that long. and it’s nice, he thinks to himself one night before sleeping, after getting a good night message from jaemin, that it’s nice to have a friend.

-

 

“what do you think about going to regular school, kids?” his dad asks after dinner and renjun has to keep himself from shrieking, reducing it to a wide grin. jisung looks shocked from where he’s seated beside renjun, exchanging glances with everyone on the table.

 

once he’s done with the dishes, the first thought that goes to his mind is “i have to tell jaemin!” so he sends out a quick ‘i’ll be over at jaemin’s’ to his parents before he runs off, knocking twice at the neighbour’s front door.

 

jaemin’s mom opens the door and before she could even ask what renjun needs, he asks “is jaemin home?” jaemin’s mom kindly leading him up to jaemin’s room. the fact that he just ran off to their house without notice when he could’ve just sent out a text to tell the other boy about his school news dawns upon him and he almost stops to excuse himself and tell jaemin’s mom that he should go. almost until he hears jaemin answering his door and all renjun does is leap in and put jaemin into a hug, telling him “i’m staying, we’re staying for good.” the moment lasting for awhile until he realizes his actions and he steps back, seeing jaemin, in his mismatched pajamas, beaming at him with his widest smile yet, jaemin’s mom already long gone.

 

he breaks the contact, looking over at jaemin’s room, seeing jaemin’s book on his desk opened, a character plushie on his bed. when he looks back at jaemin, he’s still smiling and all he could say was “i didn’t know your sheets were lilo and stitch.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i still hate writing dialogues ,, and i stand by the lactose intolerant idea
> 
> [ twt ](http://twitter.com/Ieekram) / [ cc ](http://curiouscat.me/S00NSO)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jaemin goes away for a vacation and renjun comes up with a realization.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter comes a little more than a year and half after the first chapter. 
> 
> i'd set up a timeline thing once this has enough chapters but for now it's: ch 1 > ch 3 > ch 4 > ch 2

it’s not that renjun is being clingy. 

 

“it’s just one month though.” jaemin tells him this time with the full details. they were at the school’s field, sitting by one of the benches as jeno and donghyuck play soccer a couple of feet away from them, or at least they try to. 

 

jaemin is going to san francisco for a month to visit his grandparents leaving renjun alone, back in busan, working for the summer and teaching jisung how to ride a bike for the 6th summer straight. so renjun might be, just a little bit, overreacting when he catches himself throw a pout at jaemin when he isn’t looking. 

 

“renjun, you’re such a needy boyfriend.” donghyuck says to him when he complained one time after class when he was assigned with donghyuck for classroom cleaning duty. wrong move by him. he shouldn’t have expected donghyuck to console him. 

 

“now, you’re not even denying you’re needy or that he's your boyfriend.” 

 

jaemin is renjun’s first friend. he has some rights to feel like this. renjun tells himself that every day in the mirror after shower. it’s not that he’s being clingy. it’s just that they’ve already made plans and now he has to re-do them all again because why would he want to go hike now with no one to talk to on the trails? that’s what this is all about. jaemin going away for a month is gonna ruin renjun’s planned summer algorithm. 

 

“it’s my first time travelling that far away and for that long. do you have any advice for me?” jaemin asks with such gleam in his eyes, giddy with the way he rolls his words, completely oblivious to renjun’s pouts. 

 

 _don’t leave._ renjun doesn’t say but wants to. instead, he just groans at jaemin, standing up from the bench to run to where donghyuck and jeno are. he hates soccer but this will do. 

 

jaemin leaves from busan to seoul at 2pm and renjun knows but he doesn’t send him off. renjun kind of regrets it when he gets a text from the other that says ‘i’m on the train now.’

 

he saw jaemin last night as they bid each other good night on renjun’s porch after jaemin came over to watch a movie with him. renjun acted nonchalantly when he was sending jaemin off. he pictured the scene in his mind all week before the day - him handing jaemin the hamster plushie the other had decided to leave in his room so he doesn’t have to bring it over every time he sleeps over, him initiating the hug first, telling jaemin to go and come back to him safely. instead what happens is that jaemin initiates the hug like he usually does 4 out of 5 times, jaemin tells him he wishes he could pack renjun with him, he’s sure he’ll fit in his suitcase just fine, jaemin saying he’s gonna miss him and renjun just pushes him off, telling him to stop being dramatic, not daring enough to look jaemin in the eyes and say these when he knows he’s about to cry. 

 

renjun wishes he’d done things differently but this was his first time saying goodbye. he never really needed to say goodbye to anyone in his life before. no one told him how to do it the first time. 

 

renjun comes home from his first shift in the souvenir shop with a new set of notebook and pen he picked up as a complimentary gift for his first day. the shop was something they found one time after class. it was a small one, filled with a lot of various things but mostly figures from local pororo to dragon ball and mickey mouse and his other animal friends. the collection seems endless so renjun always found himself coming back to look at them longer, enough that the grandfather who owns the shop to ask him if he’s interested to help him around during the summer. 

 

renjun sits by his desk inside his room and looks out from his window. there are no lights turned on inside jaemin’s house like they always were at night and he wishes it didn’t intensify the heavy feeling he’s had since that afternoon. 

 

he picks the notebook he got today and writes. 

 

 _dear jaeminie,_

_you’re probably still on the plane right now. time is moving slower for you than it is for me yet somehow i can feel every single second pass, dragging too long than it usually would when you’re here, laughing with me. the air is different too. i don’t know how i could tell that but must be this summer’s humidity. if i focus, i could see the dust falling down outside of my window. last year’s summer passed by so quick, and it hasn’t been a full week since this year’s summer started but i could tell it’s gonna be my longest one yet._

_come back safely. i’ll be by the porch waiting._

 

renjun tries to teach jisung how to ride his bike on days when he’s not working. the first day they try to, chenle joins them. 

 

chenle is his dad’s boss’ son, close to jisung’s age, and jisung’s first friend as what renjun likes to call him even if jisung doesn’t agree on it. 

 

“hello jisung’s first!” renjun greets chenle once his driver drops him off in their driveway. jisung was trying his best to balance himself then, falling off right exactly as chenle arrived. 

 

jisung stomps his feet loudly towards renjun to protest. “jaem hyung is my first friend. how many times do i have to tell you that?” the younger screams at him before heading to say hello to chenle who’s just looking at both of them fondly. 

 

jisung really became friends with jaemin first. renjun knows that well but some days he just wants to be a little selfish. jaemin is his first friend, he wants that to be the same for both of them even though he knows even in theory it’s always gonna be false. 

 

jaemin finally calls after a week. 

 

“that’s not true.” jaemin says over the line, and he, from what renjun can catch with the facetime version of him, is pouting at him. 

 

“i tried calling as soon as i got here but i forgot about timezones.” 

 

jaemin tried to call about 5 more times since then. most of them when renjun was at work and couldn’t pick them up. it’s not like they didn’t talk over kakao, but somehow it’s different hearing jaemin’s voice although it sounded a bit different than the usual live version, only travelling less than a meter away for him to hear, the jaemin in front of him voice. renjun had spent the first five minutes reprimanding jaemin for taking a week to call and late at night in busan at that but he knows all of it is really just for show, renjun is just glad to finally get to talk to him alone. 

 

“how’s summer over there?” he asks, shifting in his sheets, only half of his face seen from the screen but it’s late and jaemin said he didn’t mind. 

 

“humid. everything kind of different but the same?” jaemin says at first, recounting some stories about doing laundry at a shop for the first time, going by the pier and the famous golden gate park. “oh. and my grandparent’s neighbour has a cat! i forgot tell jeno!” jaemin hurriedly adds, from renjun’s unclear view of him, it looks like the other is sending a picture to jeno as they talk. he shouldn’t make anything of it other than jaemin being jaemin and jeno loving cats but some days, some nights, renjun really just wants to be selfish. 

 

“how’s everyone?” jaemin asks after. 

 

“why don’t you ask them yourself.” and really renjun doesn’t want to sound mean but it’s late and his mood had just turned sour. jaemin seems to be frowning from his screen but renjun’s eyes are starting to get heavier, he can’t really figure it out. 

 

“you should sleep.” jaemin says over and renjun just hums, closing his eyes and slowly falling asleep even before he could end their chat, missing jaemin say _i miss you_ and the chance to say it back. 

 

the hike somehow still pushes through with mark’s insistence. it started off with him and mark. donghyuck tagging along because mark’s in now and somehow jisung and chenle finds out and joins them because they don’t wanna be left out. jeno being dragged into it because it’s about time they have a friendship trip even if it’s just a hike that really none of them except renjun wanted in the first place. 

 

geumnyeonsan mountain isn’t the most famous for hiking and there usually isn’t a crowd unlike the other hiking trails in busan. this was something he and jaemin considered when they were planning months ago. and it was supposedly an easy hike, only required one an hour to reach its peak. something that non-experienced hikers like them could handle. something that could allow them to gauge if they could make the hiking a thing to keep doing, challenging higher mountains, more difficult trails in busan and maybe even outside of it. 

 

the view at the top was great from what renjun had seen from the photos but it really couldn’t rival once they’ve seen it with their own eyes. the skyline clear, the air a little bit fresher even with the 40 degrees celsius weather. 

 

“this is really nice renjun-ah!” mark tells him once they were at the top. before renjun could say something back, mark is being taken away by donghyuck, trying to take a couple selfies even though they couldn’t keep their eyes wide open with how high the sun is for them. it’s the effort that counts, renjun thinks to himself, at least they’re enjoying this together. 

 

renjun tries to keep the view into memory, pinning in some details in his mind of how the marina city skyscrapers look all the way above, and how blue the sea is that it reminds him of jaemin and his lilo and stitch collection. renjun tries to pin it, outside of the photos that he took, so he could maybe tell everything in detail to jaemin once he calls. 

 

they head straight to gwangalli beach after the hike. something close by to the mountain that they considered too when they were doing the day’s itinerary. 

 

jisung and chenle run straight to the water first followed by mark then somehow in 10 minutes everyone is in the water. jeno lifting renjun by the waist only to throw him in the water after, chenle almost losing his breath from laughing too much, the sun burning brightly against them. 

 

“i wish jaem hyung was here.” jisung blurts out in the middle of their ice cream break. after an hour of being out in the water, they one by one retreated back to find some shade and dry themselves. what’s summer without wanting to avoid sunburns anyway? 

 

“yeah.” renjun finds himself agreeing absentmindedly. the vanilla ice cream already melting away in his hand without him noticing. the day was nice but nothing like knowing it could be nicer. 

 

jaemin’s birthday falls a week before he flies back to korea but it doesn’t pass without a celebration. 

 

they gathered in chenle’s house for their mini party, donghyuck and mark taking care of the balloons, jeno setting up the rabb.it call into chenle’s living room’s 65 inch tv, renjun maneuvering both jisung and chenle into the details of their decoration and food that was kindly sponsored by chenle’s parents. they wore party hats and called jaemin right before it hit midnight in san francisco, already 4 in the afternoon in busan, 16 hours passed from when renjun celebrated jaemin’s birthday with him via facetime, him singing the birthday song in a whisper in case he wakes his parents up. jaemin making him repeat it two times more. 

 

now, jaemin appears a little pixelated in the tv screen, but his smile is still bright as all of them remembers. he’s wearing mismatched pajamas and already going ‘ooh and aah’ as chenle and jisung show him their work. they sing the happy birthday song, trying to match each other’s version despite all the internet lag. they make it work somehow, jaemin blowing the candles of the cake his grandma bought him earlier and the six of them blowing the candles off the cake renjun helped his mom make. they watch the ‘lion king’ together via rabb.it, making the distance, despite the number of miles, a little less this day somehow. 

 

renjun spends the last week before jaemin comes back painting his wall. it was something he has been thinking for a while but hasn’t told anyone yet, not even jaemin. he buys paint with the money he’s earned from his job in the shop. he spends most of his free time on it, handing jisung’s biking lessons to chenle’s (although he thinks they just settled with jisung riding on chenle’s back), he skips some of the hang outs with jeno and donghyuck, staying cooped inside his room to paint the mural, only opting to go out for dinner, even staying up later than usual after his phone calls with jaemin. 

 

renjun oversleeps the day they’re supposed to pick jaemin up from the ktx train station and this time he really doesn’t plan on missing to be the one who sees him first. he wakes up in panic, almost knocking the paint bucket as he tries to stand up, and maybe find a way to hitch-hike someone’s car to get to the station. he cries out in pain as his left foot bumps into his bed frame, hearing his door creak as it opens. jaemin peeking his head, face full of concern. 

 

this isn’t how renjun has pictured his first meeting with jaemin would be like. not when his hair is disheveled, his shirt with paint stains, his face unwashed and him crying out in pain. 

 

jaemin comes up to him, coaxing his dirty foot, reprimanding the bed frame for hurting his injunie, before he turns his head to smile at renjun, softly, something that renjun likes to think is reserved for him alone. something that makes renjun heart skip a beat.

 

if there’s anything that renjun gets from the whole month jaemin is away, with the daily letters he writes to him in that notebook he got for free that he keeps close, away from anyone to see, with how more often than not, he falls asleep to jaemin’s voice registering on the other line, with how much he gets giddy crossing out one more day in his calendar as soon as he wakes up. if there’s anything that he gets from seeing jaemin up close and in his room again, it’s this: it’s not that renjun was being clingy, he thinks he just might be falling in love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it looks like i'm only capable of writing fics full of longing this week lol 
> 
> *** rabb.it is a website if u dont know! it might be useful for u and ur friends


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